海角大神

GOP lawmakers in Tennessee passed a new congressional map that carves up the state鈥檚 only Democratic-held House seat representing Memphis, a majority-Black city. The map, passed on Thursday, now goes to Republican Gov. Bill Lee for his signature. Tennessee joins other GOP-run states in the South that have seized on last month鈥檚 Supreme Court ruling against race-based redistricting to redraw district lines for partisan gains ahead of midterm elections in November. Tennessee鈥檚 map moves Black voters in the Memphis area, who overwhelmingly support Democrats, into three different districts with substantial Republican majorities.
Our coverage: Voting rights ruling amps up redistricting contests. Will states move before November?

Labour sees major losses in early UK election returns. Polls show that British Prime Minister Keir Starmer is deeply unpopular, and early results from local elections across the United Kingdom Thursday are bearing that out. His Labour Party has been hammered. But Labour鈥檚 traditional rival, the Conservative Party, is also doing poorly. The result points to a continuing shift away from the generations-old political establishment to new parties like far-right Reform UK. More results will come in today, including from Scotland and Wales.

Pope Leo XIV received U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio at the Vatican on Thursday, following a rare period of open tension between the leader of the Catholic Church and the American president. On social media, President Donald Trump has unleashed personal attacks against the Chicago-born pontiff, who has spoken out against the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran. Officials from the Vatican and the U.S. State Department described the 2 1/2-hour meeting between Secretary Rubio and the pope in positive terms, though few details about what was discussed were released.

The leaders of Brazil and the United States met at the White House. In a closed-door meeting on Thursday, President Luiz In谩cio Lula da Silva met with President Trump almost a year after the United States slapped 50% tariffs on Brazil and sanctioned a Supreme Court justice over a court case against Trump ally and former right-wing populist President Jair Bolsonaro. These talks were seen as an opportunity for Lula, as the Brazilian president is known, to reset a rocky bilateral relationship, and he was expected to broach critical minerals and cooperation fighting organized crime. The two leaders skipped a scheduled news conference, but Mr. Trump posted on Truth Social, 鈥淲e discussed many topics, including Trade and, specifically, Tariffs. The meeting went very well.鈥�
Our coverage: Brazil鈥檚 Lula is on the left. So, how has he avoided Trump鈥檚 scorn?

Nigerian troops rescued nine people abducted听from an orphanage. Authorities said gunmen stormed an Islamic orphanage in Lokoja, in central Nigeria, on April 26 and kidnapped 23 pupils from the facility. Fifteen people were recovered shortly after the attack. School kidnappings for ransom have become a recurring problem in Nigeria, with more than 300 students and teachers abducted from a school in the country in 2025. The latest rescue took place in a nearby forest area, according to the army.

鈥� Compiled by Monitor writers around the world

Since late 2024, and now as part of the U.S.-Israel war against Iran, Lebanon鈥檚 Tehran-backed Hezbollah militia has been the target of powerful and persistent Israeli attacks. So, how is it that it keeps on fighting, even intensifying its own attacks on Israel?

President Donald Trump鈥檚 reported plan to punish NATO allies over Iran war disputes, alongside troop pullbacks from Germany, has renewed Europe鈥檚 efforts to strengthen independent defenses. It also signals a faltering transatlantic security bond.

Antisemitic crime is an increasing concern for Britain鈥檚 quarter-million Jews. Institutions like Shomrim North West London, a volunteer neighborhood patrol, are helping to respond to attacks like last week鈥檚 stabbings in Golders Green.

"The Sheep Detectives" unfolds a murder mystery in which a flock searches for its shepherd's killer. Raised on detective novels read aloud by their caretaker, the sheep scour the countryside for clues in a film that entertains children and adults.

North Korea has closely watched Russia鈥檚 failure to conquer Ukraine along with Iran鈥檚 calamitous missteps in trying to dominate the Middle East with proxy militias. This week, news broke that the regime in Pyongyang might have learned a lesson about avoiding such misguided aggression.

After more than seven decades of threatening to use force to reunify with South Korea, it officially gave up claims on its neighbor on the Korean Peninsula. It rewrote its constitution to remove an obligation to 鈥渞ealize the reunification of the fatherland鈥� and the ethnic Korean people.

This does not mean Seoul and its American ally can now stand down their defensive forces against the North鈥檚 nuclear arsenal. Nor has South Korea given up hope of peaceful reunification. But the constitutional change, which was first signaled in 2023, suggests a warming of what has been a long, cold peace.

To add to a possible new normal, a North Korean women鈥檚 soccer team will travel to Seoul to compete against a South Korean team, the first such match in years. The May 20 tournament, held by the Asian Football Confederation, means the two nations must coordinate on security and other arrangements.

Under its new policy, North Korea frames the match as between separate countries. In general, it describes relations as 鈥渢wo hostile states,鈥� perhaps a recognition that the two are only technically at war after a 1950-53 conflict that ended in an armistice.

Despite that, the constitutional change 鈥渕ay provide part of the institutional groundwork for peaceful coexistence between the two Koreas,鈥� Lee Jung-chul, a North Korea expert at Seoul National University, told The Korea Herald.

Other changes hint that the country鈥檚 leader, Kim Jong Un, might now realize that North Korea 鈥� and its largely closed economy 鈥� must be more open. 鈥淭his fits in the context of a prolonged effort to redefine North Korea as a 鈥榥ormal state鈥� just like any other,鈥� Christopher Green of the International Crisis Group, told the Financial Times.

The previous normal 鈥� preparing to break through the borders of another country 鈥� has lately not worked well for a few other countries.

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